PHOTO BY DON MENNIG
BY SHAGGY SHRAGIS
Philadelphia went into the weekend with a plan. Play efficiently enough to force Boston to do the same, hope to convert the pressure into a win, then ride the momentum through the weekend to New York on Sunday in a must win rematch against the Empire. The winner of Sunday’s game was going to the playoff, while the loser would be watching from home.
The plan against Boston nearly worked. Philly played one of its best offensive games of the year, going 11/19 on O-line possessions, and holding on nearly 70% of all offensive points. Sean Mott and Sam Grossberg were electric, with 81 completions and seven assists on just three total turnovers. Scott Heyman and Brandon Pastor, both returning from absences in the Montreal game, connecting twice for goals. Heyman finished with five assists, leading all players in goals thrown Friday evening. Boston’s defense also came to play, with Sadok leading the charge, putting together an emphatic 46 completions, 585 yard, zero turnover game. Neither offense yielded an inch, and neither defense let up the pressure. Despite generating only six break chances a piece, each team had three breaks as well, a 50% break rate that is far more impressive than it seems given the way the two teams were playing. Rookie Max Tran had two blocks, while Nate Little had one, a dominant sky over Boston big man Orion Cable.
Unfortunately, in a game where both teams play equal frisbee, the smallest margins can lead to victory. In this match, it was end-of-quarter execution, an area in which Philly has struggled all season. Boston scored the last point in each of the first three quarters, and opened the second and fourth with offensive holds, giving them two “half-breaks” that put them over the top. On the one hand, Boston has an elite buzzer beater team, with Babbitt, Orion Cable, Tannor Johnson-Go and Tobe Decraene all top tier jump ball talent. Whereas, Philadelphia is not a particularly good jump ball team, especially with Greg Martin out. A strength of the ‘24 Phoenix, the departures of James Pollard and Max Trifillis are felt the strongest in these buzzer beater moments. But the Phoenix missed on a more fundamental level between last second turnovers, throws short of the endzone and an exhilarating end of the third quarter with the Phoenix disc on the goal line, only for Boston’s Sadok to come in with a layout block and score in under six seconds.
Philadelphia walked away Friday night with a 14-15 loss. Despite the loss, emotions were riding high from the quality of play. “That was the best game we’ve played all season,” said one Phoenix player. “If we play like that against New York, we’ll beat them for sure.”
The Phoenix did bring the same play against New York. Sunday’s game started well, with Philadelphia finding the first break chance on a block by Chase Rawlins and a later drop from New York, but a pair of Matt LaBar Ds got the disc back for New York, who would hold then break on the next possession, taking a 6-4 lead into the second quarter. A second quarter in which the Phoenix season fell apart. Philadelphia held to start, then conceded seven straight scores, including a Callahan and six turnovers without a block to the Empire. It was agonizing to watch the season slip away one missed throw after another. Philly bounced back in the second half, but the Empire’s strong start was too much to overcome and New York walked away with a 26-14 win.
While the Phoenix offense struggled, the defense did not help. Philly went one for seven on break chances, a dismal 14% DLC and a paltry 6% break percentage. This is the second time this season that the Phoenix defense has generated just a single break, the other coming at the hands of Boston in the June 7 contest. While one for seven is bad, the seven is much worse than the one. The Phoenix could have broken on all seven break opportunities Sunday, and still lost the game.
Ultimately, the focus needs to shift from trying to maximize efficiency to trying to maximize chances. The Phoenix had just five games this season where the defense forced double digit break opportunities, and while the actual conversion on those opportunities was all across the board — 12 of 14 against Pittsburgh (86%) to five of 16 against DC (31%) — all five of those games were wins. In the other six games in 2025 Philly generated less than 10 break chances, and the Hotbirds lost. While it would be nice to have a hyper efficient scoring defense, a more accessible approach would be to increase the number of opportunities that the defense has to score. It is much easier to score five breaks on 16 chances like they did against DC than it would be to score five breaks on six chances, like Philly did against Boston in the Friday loss. Boston can limit possessions because they have the personnel to execute with razor thin margins. Philly does not, which means they need to maximize their possessions in order to widen those margins.
Philadelphia may have been eliminated from the playoffs, but they still have a chance to make some history this weekend. The Phoenix have only won two games against opponents with a winning record once in franchise history — the 2019 series sweep of the 8-4 Toronto Rush — as well as defeated DC in two or more games in a single season — 2013. Saturday could also mark the third time in Phoenix history the team has ended a season with six or more wins. Even with the brutal loss to New York, this is the seventh time in Phoenix history the team has had five or more wins in a season, placing it firmly in the top half of performances historically for Philadelphia.
While frustrating in hindsight, it's important to remember where the Phoenix were at the beginning of the season. With departures of three of five top leaders in plus minus over the last three seasons — Dmitry Suvorov, James Pollard and Max Trifillis — an entirely new O-line handling core and a completely fresh coaching staff, pundits were piling dirt upon the Phoenix from the outset. Adam Ruffner had ranked Philadelphia as 19th in his preseason power rankings, last in the division and a good deal behind teams like Pittsburgh, Toronto and Montreal — all squads Philly will finish ahead of in 2025. Outside of myself, no one who writes anything about the UFA picked Philly to finish with two wins, let alone five. Philly revitalized the roster with an infusion of youth, and pushed its established stars into positions where they excelled. For the Phoenix, the most important thing moving forward isn’t necessarily player development or a schematic adjustment, its player retention. If all the Fledgling Firebirds stay in the City of Brotherly Love, the future for the Phoenix is white hot.
Don’t miss the action, get your tickets for the last game of the season this Saturday July 19 at 6 p.m. at Neumann University where the Phoenix will take on DC Breeze and hope to make franchise history.
